Nobody likes to lose, whether it is at Texas Holdem, Foosball, Monopoly, or dodge ball. Many poker players are notorious for being bad losers, and lots of them somehow think that a holdem defeat is not valid because their opponent sucked out with cards they should have folded. The “you won, but you played all wrong” gripe is a common whine whether the complainer is a novice or a poker pro. The problem is, in the rush to give a successful opponent the comeuppance they no doubt richly deserve (note the sarcasm), some players (especially those who play poker online) take a short cut and become poker room cheats. This is what happened when Full Tilt sponsored poker pro, Brian Hastings, got sick isuldur1’s winning ways and entered into a conspiracy of collusion with Brian Townsend, and Cole South to cut the lethal, high stakes poker player down to size.
Three on one is hardly fair odds, and anyone who plays poker online knows that any site worth its domain name doesn’t tolerate collusion or look kindly on poker room cheats. So these Three Stooges of the Texas Holdem world were caught, one of them got away with only a slap on the wrist.
Brian Hastings wears the Full Tilt patch and represents them every time he plays a hand of holdem, stud, draw, or go fish. They punished him for cheating by taking away his sponsorship for a month. That is all. Maybe they somehow lack perspective on this, but this incident brings shame upon their entire organization. Pete Rose was banned from baseball and the hall of fame for gaming the system. The best quarterback nobody has ever heard of, Art Schlichter, blew an NFL career when he was caught point shaving back in his Ohio State Buckeye days. Getting together with your friends to collude in an online poker game is, at least, on that level.
Brian Hastings should never again wear the Full Tilt patch (or be sponsored by any other poker room). If it were possible, all three should be barred from playing online again. That part is unrealistic, but the punishment should be much more than a month without sponsorship.
